Borrow the Moonlight
by Wyst0660
Summary: Galinda can't sleep. Implied GelphieActual Gelphie later, rating will change!


My first attempt at Wicked fanfic! Book verse – later Gelphie. Sorry about the title, I'm terrible with them! Oh well. More chapters to come later! Rated for later content. Please tell me what you think!

Disclaimer: Wicked belongs to someone else :'(

---

Galinda Upland of the Arduennas heaved a put upon sigh, and twisted under her pristine white bed linens. It had seemed in the beginning that the near side of the room would have been draughtier, being that the heavy, old wood door was there – so naturally, she had made sure her unfortunate roomie had ended up sleeping on that side. However, the drapes were hardly practical, hung so decoratively that they would not close properly – and a constant beam of pearly moonlight sliced across the room. Miss Elphaba – comfortably asleep in the darkness of the near side, Galinda noted disdainfully – had once pulled those forsaken curtains down from their railings trying to achieve privacy, and now they were also crooked – adding insult to injury.

And it wasn't as though Miss Galinda hadn't been insulted enough this semester. Her roommate was hardly the attractive, beneficial socialite she had hoped for. Galinda scowled at the prone form in the next bed, and it was as if Miss Elphaba had sensed it – stirring fitfully in her sleep, she kicked the worn woollen blanket away. In the vagueness of the night light, she hardly looked green at all – but Galinda couldn't help staring at those thin, emerald legs, her arms, and the tiny strip of midriff Elphaba would have covered immediately if she'd been awake. She really was green all over, then – how peculiar. Galinda had never considered Elphaba as being a whole person before. It was just as Galinda found herself wondering if Elphaba's insides were green as well that she stretched and groaned, bleary eyes fluttering open. She couldn't see as well as Galinda at first, and didn't seem to notice that the blonde had her eyes trained on her. It was fascinating to see the green girl unguarded. Elphaba scratched her stomach, stretching her legs again, and Galinda found herself prodding her own soft, fleshy belly – forgetting for a moment that her roommate was cursed with fluorescent skin and finding herself envious of those taught hips and flat abdomen. Her corsets _had_ needed tightening lately, hadn't they?

She was so taken with her own wallowing insecurities that Galinda failed to notice Elphaba's glinting eyes had focused at long last, pious indignation written all over her face.

"What are you staring at?" she hissed, arching an eyebrow.

"Oh!" Galinda flushed, her attention snapping back to her roommate. She regarded her for a moment, as if deciding if it was wise to tell the truth. With little other option, she supplied: "You're so _thin_, Miss Elphaba."

"And what of it?" Elphaba had sat up, and was reaching for her discarded blanket. "Don't tell me you're concerned for my eating habits, Miss Galinda, you're hardly concerned with my existence to begin with."

"That's not true," Galinda lied. "But no," she added, huffing. "If you must know, I'm rather envious."

Galinda chewed her lip as she pondered the admission, wondering precisely what it meant. She was about to decide that it didn't alter their relationship – which had, for that week, been civil at least - when Elphaba laughed, apparently choosing not to dignify her confession with a response. She settled beneath the blanket, and turned her back to Galinda – who was glad, because it meant Elphaba wouldn't see the pout that had formed neatly on her lips.

For a long moment, they were silent. Elphaba closed her eyes and tried not to listen to Galinda's breathing, which didn't sound nearly rhythmic enough for her to have fallen asleep. If anything it sounded as though she was huffing and sighing to herself, squirming all over her bed relentlessly. It was most irritating, but saying something might initiate further complaining, and that was the last thing Elphaba wanted. Since she and Galinda had struck up conversation the week previously, life had been easier. Suddenly there were no silent face-offs over the bathroom in the morning, and when Crope or Tibbet (they wouldn't let on which) had swallowed Elphaba's room key (to settle a bet, Elphaba didn't like to ask), Galinda had been there to let her back in. _Little_ things - that had made the daily chore of existing alongside someone like Miss Galinda Upland all the more bearable – still, Elphaba didn't feel it was her job to discuss girth with her in the middle of the night.

"Miss Elphaba?" the voice was small, and unhappy, wheedling for attention.

"What is it?" Elphaba snapped, thumping her pillow as if punishing the feathers inside with brute force would expel her frustration. It didn't, and now the pillow was flat.

"I can't sleep," Galinda sighed. "And tomorrow I'll have bags under my eyes, and I shall look positively awful."  
"Sit next to me tomorrow, then," Elphaba shot back acridly. "Problem solved, goodnight."

"If I sit next you I shall look enormous _and _exhausted, and what sort of image will that give everyone?"  
"One of you in the kitchens at midnight, I should expect." Elphaba regretted it the moment she had said it, but there was no way to take back the words – and Galinda had already started.

"So you DO think I've gained weight! I knew it! Oh, Elphie, don't let me have any breakfast in the morning, will you?"  
"At this rate we'll be sleeping through breakfast," Elphaba couldn't help but add, but she turned over to face her roomie, lit by that pest of a window. Galinda was sitting bolt upright, staring at her dark reflection in the mirror opposite her bed, prodding at her round face as if it would magically change the shape of it. She wasn't fat in the slightest - round where Elphaba was pointed, certainly, but if Galinda was fat, then half of OZ was morbidly obese. Elphaba found that the words to say so had failed her, though, so instead she decided to offer up advice to keep Galinda from starving herself, at least.

"You ought to eat something at breakfast," she said. "Otherwise you'll be ravenous at lunch and eat twice as much as you normally would."

Galinda looked alarmed, weighing this new information as if she'd been told the apocalypse was due. "I see," she nodded, although her voice wavered. She didn't seem any happier.

"Oh, honestly," Elphaba snapped, chucking her blanket away with force, forgetting her shyness as she lit the lamp. She wore an old corset cover – one that was far too loose for her - and a pair of rather vintage looking bloomers that sat low on her hips; they were too big for her, too. Galinda's gaze followed Elphaba as she stormed across the room, through the beam of moonlight and wrenched the door to the bathroom open, lighting a lamp inside.

"What are you doing?" Galinda asked, holding her bed cover up to her face as if it would protect her.  
"You brought those ridiculous scales all the way from Gillikin, Miss Galinda, and I think it's high time we made use of them so that I might get a wink of sleep before sunrise." Elphaba said, raising an eyebrow.

"Oh," Galinda didn't move. When Elphaba didn't either, she reluctantly slipped out of bed – dressed in a full flowing blue nightgown. Elphaba was impressed that it had fitted in the bed at all.

"You cannot possibly be comfortable in that," she remarked. "It's little wonder you can't sleep."

"Hmph," Galinda's nose was in the air as she passed Elphaba, adding: "Well, I should have thought that you of all people would have had more shame, Miss Elphaba."   
Elphaba scowled at her, folding her arms. "On the scales, it's not me who's up half the night wailing about her figure."

Gingerly, Galinda stepped on to the contraption, squinting at the mirror reflecting the weight. She sucked in her breath, stricken by the three-digit number she was faced with. How could it be? Surely at this rate she would be wider than she was tall by the end of the week! What would the misses Pfannee and ShenShen say? What would they say when she wasn't _present_ in the room? It simply wouldn't do.

Elphaba squinted up at her, spindly arms still crossed firmly over her chest, and Galinda immediately felt that this had been a dreadful idea.

"What?" Elphaba couldn't seem to help asking, and Galinda shook her head, hopping down as daintily as she could accomplish.

"Nothing!" She tried to say airily, although it sounded rather strangled in actuality. "Tomorrow I shall only be having coffee at breakfast - without cream or sugar."  
Elphaba drew a long breath, sighing as if completely defeated. She grabbed the back of Galinda's night gown as she passed, yanking it up an inch.  
"This thing alone probably weighs the same as a Munchkin," she said, wrinkling her nose. "A _family_ of Munchkins…" She corrected herself as she tested the weight further.

Galinda squealed at the indignity of it all, trying to wrest herself free with little effect. "Miss Elphaba, this is most improper!" she declared, turning.

"You've got another one under it!" Elphaba cried, lifting the skirt again to reveal a white underskirt beneath it. "You've got _formal_ sleepwear? Galinda, really, the ridiculous nature of your chosen apparel aside, you'd be better off weighing yourself again without it."

Galinda blushed, and then realised she had blushed, and blushed more deeply for it – she squirmed, twisting to face Elphaba – her expression furious. "Miss Elphaba, I do believe we've crossed a line of propriety we cannot recross," Galinda announced, trying not to look too mortified as she grabbed Elphaba's wrists, trying to force the green girl to let go of her nightgown. "I will not undress for you -" her breath seemed to catch in her throat as her fingers slid along slender arms, and she found herself holding Elphaba's hands, glaring hotly into her roommate's dark, unreadable eyes. For a moment they were locked in a silent mental battle – neither one sure of what to do, to say, but each equally perplexed by the notion of remaining where they were. Galinda swallowed visibly, chewing her lower lip – biting down harder as Elphaba's eyelids dropped, watching the movement. This was easily the first time she had touched Elphaba's skin, and found herself surprised that it wasn't cool and reptilian at all. Then, to her absolute horror, she realised that Elphaba's fingers had relaxed – she had _let go _– several moments previously. And for all her curiosity, it simply wouldn't do to – to - …well. It just wouldn't.

Galinda leapt away from Elphaba, primly flattening her night gown with unsteady hands.

"I will not undress for you." She repeated, with a degree of finality she hadn't thought necessary.

"_For_ me?" Elphaba cackled cruelly, indignation creeping into her tone as she side-stepped nimbly around the enormous set of scales, blowing out the lamp in the bathroom harshly as she passed the door. "Miss Galinda, I had absolutely no desire to see you in your nightgown, let alone out of it – it is you who is keeping us both awake, driven to irrationality by insomnia, no doubt." Elphaba slid into bed, and blew the bedside lamp out as well, leaving Galinda to stand in the moonlight. "Goodnight."

Galinda huffed, and waited, as if expecting something – anything – from her roomie. When nothing came, she sighed: "Goodnight, Miss Elphaba."   
"And Galinda," Elphaba said – out of the darkness – "Have some breakfast in the morning."

---

To be continued:)


End file.
